


I'd swing with you for the fences

by queentheea



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: ADHD! Bellamy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood Friends, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Mythology References, Roommates, artist! clarke, bartender! bellamy, basically all the good stuff?, title from folklore because I'm a simp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:46:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26183659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queentheea/pseuds/queentheea
Summary: Clarke struggles to convince her best friend Bellamy of his own brilliance. She also struggles to tell him that she loves him. A lot.Prompted for the t100 Writers For BLM Initiative: ADHD Bellamy and bellarke with Bellamy info dumping ancient history/mythology facts to Clarke
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin
Comments: 18
Kudos: 151
Collections: The t100 Writers for BLM Initiative





	I'd swing with you for the fences

**Author's Note:**

  * For [j0ell0](https://archiveofourown.org/users/j0ell0/gifts).



> This is a prompt I took on for t100 Writers For BLM Initiative, which is a wonderful cause! You can prompt participating writers to write exactly what you want, just choose a BLM charity of your choice and submit the donation confirmation to the initiative's Tumblr! I'm still accepting more prompts for the time being, I'll link my Tumblr in the end notes if you'd like to submit a prompt.
> 
> Special thanks to [bellamythology](https://archiveofourown.org/users/onemanbellarmy/pseuds/bellamythology) and [maunwocha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/maunwocha/pseuds/maunwocha) for betaing this fic for me! As a person with ADHD it was great to be able to dive into this prompt, especially over time and portray the growth and how ADHD can be completely multifaceted.
> 
> Title from Peace - Taylor Switt

The thing about Bellamy that people don’t tend to understand is that he is brilliant. Through all of the years that Clarke has known him she’s watched as teachers would say the usual bullshit that kids with ADHD would hear. Favourites over the years being “if only he would apply himself more,” and “Bellamy can be very disrespectful in class by speaking out of turn and not paying attention.”

When they met on the playground all those years back, it didn’t take long for them to click. Clarke had been eating her cheesestring in peace, dreaming about the new watercolours her father had bought her when a boy with loose curls sat next to her on the bench and opened his centaur lunch box. Not that Clarke had any clue what a centaur was at the time.

“Did you know that Cronus ate his babies because he was scared they would become more powerful than him,” he’d asked her rather abruptly.

“Who’s Cronus?” seven-year-old Clarke had responded.

“He’s the god of time and the king of the titans,” young Bellamy had said. He’d given her a funny look after that, almost as though he was shocked that she didn’t already know. Clarke had later asked him what a titan was, and he’d recounted as much of the history of the titans and gods that he could before the bell rang and they had to go back to class. Clarke wasn’t even sure he’d taken a breath between sentences.

The next day at school, Bellamy once again found Clarke at recess, but this time he had a book of (child friendly) Greek myths along with his lunch box. Clarke remembers sitting patiently and listening to him for the rest of recess that day as well as he went through the book and pointed to photos of the gods, goddesses and titans he had told her about the day before. The day after that, Clarke found Bellamy.

Clarke had never thought of him as weird or disrespectful like so many adults seemed to. They became fast friends and ended up in the same class the following year, during which Bellamy continued to spout fun mythology facts whenever he learned something new. Mrs. Sydney, their third grade teacher, hated Bellamy’s interjections. She’d give them a new assignment to work on and Bellamy would lean over to tell Clarke another story about a quarrel between Persephone and Aphrodite, and Mrs. Sydney would call for him to head to the principal’s office for being disrespectful. It never made any sense to Clarke. Bellamy should’ve been the one teaching the class, even at eight years old.

A couple of years later, after numerous complaints from other teachers about distracted behaviour and disrespect, Bellamy and Clarke got put into Mr. Kane’s class. Mr. Kane was different from the rest. He had kind eyes, and compassion, and he never publicly humiliated Bellamy in front of their peers. One day when they were walking home from school together, Bellamy told Clarke that Mr. Kane had called his mom and suggested that she take him to get tested for something called ADHD. Clarke had never heard the term before. When the child psychologist Bellamy had been referred to confirmed Mr. Kane’s suspicions a few weeks later, she asked him what it meant.

“Dr. Luna says that my brain is moving with superspeed, like a car, and that I just need a little bit of help learning how to use the brakes.”

“So your mom is going to let you learn to drive the car now?” Clarke had asked at the time, finding the idea ridiculous. None of this had really meant anything to her. Bellamy was still Bellamy, even if the doctor had told him he had a really fast brain.

No matter what anyone else thought over the years, Clarke has stuck to Bellamy like glue. He’s her person, and he always has been. Other kids didn’t always understand his tangents or the way he thought, but kids were kids. When they made it to high school, movie nights at the Blakes’ turned into study sessions. Bellamy was overjoyed that he got to pick history as one of his elective courses. He finally had somewhere to focus his energy that he was excited about, and Clarke was there to make sure he got the assignments for the rest of his classes done and didn’t end up in an endless hole of research for his history papers.

Clarke will say that it was sheer coincidence that they ended up at colleges in the same city, and it was out of pure convenience that they moved into an apartment together off campus.

Today, she pulls open the door of The Dropship, where Bellamy works, to celebrate the submission of her last paper of her college career. Bellamy still has a couple of exams left before he’s done. The bell rings as she opens the door and immediately he looks up from where he’s wiping the bar top, a towel slung over his shoulder. He flashes her a lopsided grin and gestures at her usual spot, which is taken by a young brunette. Clarke rolls her eyes at him and moves to sit in a booth to wait.

He joins her moments later with some strange new concoction in hand. He sets the glass down in front of her as he slides into the booth.

“So I guess congratulations are in order.”

“Not yet. They still have to tell me that I passed.”

“Yeah, like there’s a chance you’d fail,” Bellamy deadpans back. Clarke smiles as she turns her attention to the beverage on the table.

“So what have you got for me this time?”

“I call this one The Orthrus, after the two-headed dog killed by Heracles.”

“And why’s that?”

“Because if you drink too many of them they’ll have you seeing double.” Clarke takes a sip of the drink and coughs in response. Bellamy didn’t hold back. The drink is strong.

“One of these days Mr. Miller is going to revoke your cocktail creation and naming privileges if you keep going like this.”

“Nah. This one isn’t on the menu. I whipped it up special just for you.”

Clarke hopes she isn’t blushing at that.

She’s known for at least a few years now that she’s in love with Bellamy. It would’ve been hard not to fall in love with him. It’s the little things he does like make breakfast for her every Sunday morning without fail, or create playlists for her to listen to while she paints. In the winter, Bellamy had wrapped Clarke in a blanket and sat with her on their fire escape until two in the morning on the anniversary of her father’s death as she cried. He’d found her in the cold on her own and refused to leave her alone.

He’s also very good looking. There’s that.

So Clarke knows that she loves Bellamy. The tricky thing is that he isn’t quite aware of that particular detail. It’s moments like these that Clarke wonders if he feels the same way. She’s always been too scared to do anything about it. One confession on her part puts a lifelong friendship at risk.

The arrival of the rest of their friends is made obvious by the commotion as the bell on the door rings once again. Bellamy slides out of the booth to greet them and heads back to the bar as Raven places herself in the seat next to Clarke and plants a wet one on her cheek.

“Happy graduation, boo,” she slurs.

“Are you already drunk?”

“Tipsy. Jasper and Monty insisted that we pregame before we headed here. I agreed in hopes that you might have that conversation we talked about.”

“It isn’t the right time,” Clarke mutters to her under her breath. Of all their friends, Raven is the only one that knows about Clarke’s unfortunate feelings for her best friend and roommate.

“Bullshit!” Raven responds, and a few of their friends turn towards them with eyebrows raised before going back to their own conversations. “There will never be a right time,” she says more quietly.

“I know, okay? I’m working on it, I swear.”

“You might want to work a bit faster if you want to get a chance at all.” Clarke turns to follow Raven’s line of sight and sees Bellamy holding a casual conversation with the brunette from earlier as he cleans a glass. Clarke finishes her drink in a single gulp.

* * *

“What am I even going to do with a degree in history?” Bellamy asks later that night, as he rounds the couch in their apartment, popcorn in hand. Movie night has been their tradition every second Thursday since they moved in together.

“What am I going to do with a fine arts degree,” Clarke counters.

“Open a gallery, freelance, teach?”

“You could teach too!”

Bellamy makes a face.“And go back for even more school to get my teaching certification or a graduate degree? I barely got through these last four years.”

“Bellamy, this is your area of interest, though! You blasted through all your undergrad history classes.”

“And I almost failed half of my electives because I couldn’t focus, or I kept procrastinating, or both!” he exclaims in frustration. Even as an adult, ADHD was something Bellamy was constantly fighting with. Even after a couple years of behavioural therapy as a kid and a couple rounds of different medications to help him focus, school still proved to be a struggle unless he was truly invested in the subject.

“Bell, you’re so damn smart. I wish you could see it.”

Bellamy looks at her with an unreadable expression for a bit. After a few beats of silence, he takes a breath.

“Maybe it’s just as well that neither of us have our shit together. God knows if you knew what you wanted to do you’d be getting all these amazing job offers and would have moved half across the country by now. I’m not ready to lose my favourite roommate.”

Clarke scoffs, “I’m your only roommate,” then more seriously, “You sell yourself short, you know.”

“You sell yourself short. I’ve seen your art, Clarke. And I’ve heard you talk about art. You’re going to be fine after graduation

Now would be the perfect time to tell him, she thinks. The way he’s looking at her almost gives her hope that this thing between them isn’t completely one sided. Instead, she reaches across his lap and grabs the remote from where it’s resting beside him and unpauses the documentary they had selected.

* * *

A couple of days later, Clarke wakes to a knock at the door. She isn’t expecting anyone, but it wasn’t all that early either. Maybe Bellamy had forgotten his key on his way out? She pulls her hair into a messy bun and makes her way to the door. She swings it open to reveal a woman holding a notebook on the other side. Clarke vaguely recognizes her from The Dropship the other night.

“Oh. Hi. Is Bellamy home?” she asks politely.

“No, he’s stepped out. Can I relay a message to him?”

“I just wanted to return these notes he’d lent me. Don’t think I would have gotten through the final without him. Sorry, I didn’t realize he had a girlfriend.”

“Yeah, I’ll let him know you stopped by…” Clarke trails off.

“Echo.”

“Right.” Clarke takes the notes from the other woman. “Well, I’ll let him know.”

“Thanks.”

With that she’s turned on her heel and disappeared down the hallway. It’s only after Clarke closes the door that she realizes she didn’t bother to correct Echo’s assumption.

* * *

After a long phone call with Raven that consisted of half-pep-talk-half-nagging, Clarke thinks she’s finally ready to do it. She’s going to tell Bellamy about her feelings, before someone or something else comes between them and she ends up regretting not saying something earlier.

The night of Bellamy’s final exam of his college career is when Clarke decides she’s sick of the will-they-won’t-they and what-could-have-been. She’s going to tell him. Tonight.

Of course, not all plans are carried out as smoothly as they are thought out. Any one of Bellamy’s favourite myths could have taught her that. Bellamy comes barreling through the door a few hours into Clarke’s antsy pacing across their carpet.

“I bombed it, I totally bombed it. I just couldn’t get myself to pay attention to the material, and the words on the page kept blurring and I swear I read the prompt for that essay question at least ten times without really understanding what it was asking.”

“Bellamy, you’re not going to fail…” She tries to interrupt, but he doesn’t seem to hear her.

“I’m never going to graduate!”

“You don’t even know that you failed it yet!” He’d taken the offending course twice before, yes, but no one had told him that he’s for sure failed it this time. Yet.

“I feel like Sisyphus pushing that goddamn boulder up the fucking hill for the rest of time. But the boulder is ECON 101 and the hill is my entire college career!”

“Or are you Heracles completing the twelve labours?” Clarke tries. “Sure, they were hard and grueling, but he made it through and you will too!”

Bellamy finally looks at her then and she feels a spike of courage.

“I’ve grown up with you, and you’re so passionate, and smart, and determined. Sure, you’ve had to retake a couple of courses, but no one is going to look at your and put a couple meaningless mandatory electives over the rest of your successes in your program. One of your professors had you TA for him last semester because he was so impressed with your work when you took the class! He believed in you then!”

Clarke gulps. No turning back now.

“And… And if you need something to hold onto right now, know that I believe in you. I believe in you so much. I know you, Bellamy. You have such a huge heart, but beyond that you’re so damn smart. You have such a unique perspective. You inspire people, you inspire me. You’ve struggled so much but you’ve pushed through and you’ve worked so hard. No one deserves success and happiness more than you.”

“You make me happy,” and he says it so softly Clarke wonders if she misheard him. The honesty and the vulnerability in his eyes grabs hold of her, and for the first time Clarke really allows herself to hope that her feelings haven’t been entirely one-sided all of these years. She moves closer to him and takes his hand.

“I think,” he begins, “that I’m scared. I’m scared of graduation and what it means for us. I’m scared of what life is going to look like now, and I’m scared that we’ll get separated. We’re going to have to get jobs, you know? And move on with our lives. It’s been you beside me for my whole life, I don’t know anything else. No one else understands me the way you do. If you or I got a job somewhere else and we had to move out, the thought of losing you, of not being able to see you every day scares me half to death.”

“Hey,” Clarke says. “You’re not going to lose me. You’d never lose me. Even if we were separated by work, or life, or anything, you’d never lose me.”

Bellamy stares down to where their hands are still joined. “But that’s the thing. I don’t want you to go anywhere without me.”

Clarke’s eyes widen at that and he must think that he’s said too much because he hastily pulls his hand back from hers and moves towards the kitchen, opening the fridge abruptly and scanning the contents while he taps his fingers against his thigh.

“You hungry? I’m hungry. All this worrying about flunking out of college in my final semester has really built up an appetite.”

“Bellamy-”

“Did you know Hades was able to keep Persephone in the Underworld for half the year for swallowing pomegranate seeds after she was told not to eat anything.”

“Yes, I did know that. You’ve told me. Many times.”

“Her mother Demeter created the seasons based on her own happiness over getting to see her own daughter. Can you imagine a rule so stupid? Don’t eat anything if you want to see your family again.”

“Bellamy-”

“That’s not even the stupidest rule he’s come up with. Hades also told Orpheus that if he wanted Eurydice to be able to leave the Underworld with him he couldn’t look back at her for their entire journey back home. What does that even have to do with-”

Clarke doesn’t even realize what she’s doing until she’s done it, but suddenly her lips are on his and it’s so, so good. He kisses her back almost immediately as one of his arms wraps around her back and the other comes up to caress her cheek. There isn’t a spark, there’s a whole wildfire after years of buildup and anticipation. Eventually, they pull away. Bellamy’s hand remains on her cheek, where he brushes aside a loose lock of hair that had fallen in her face.

“You know, if you wanted me to shut up you could’ve just said so,” Bellamy says teasingly, but his eyes tell a different story.

“I tried. You were a little distracted.”

He just grins at that and kisses her again. But Clarke really isn’t complaining.

* * *

A week later, Bellamy gets his marks back. He passed ECON 101 with a C+. Far from the best grade on his final transcripts, but high enough for him to be able to graduate. On the day of his graduation Clarke stands in the bleachers and cheers loudly, just as he had done for her a few days earlier. Aurora and Octavia are also there, smiling alongside Clarke and clapping for Bellamy. Abby would be joining the three of them for dinner later that evening for a joint celebration.

After dinner with their families, Bellamy and Clarke sit together on the couch at home in their apartment.

“You know, I was thinking about what you said a few weeks ago, about teaching,” Bellamy says, carding his hands through Clarke’s hair. She hums in response. “Maybe it isn’t that big of a deal. I’d only have to go back to school for one more year in order to get my certification.

“I thought you were totally done with school and never wanted to go back.”

“Yeah, but most of that is fear. Fear that I’m not focused enough or smart enough to be able to get through it or that I wouldn’t be a good enough teacher because of it.”

“I think the exact reason why you’d be an amazing teacher is because of all of that. You know what it’s like to struggle through school. You’re the perfect person to be a support system for a new generation of kids like you who have ADHD, or a learning disability.”

“I know that now,” he says, kissing the top of her head. “The more I think about it the more I think I should do it. Of course I’m still scared. I’ve spent my whole life scared of failure, or of not being enough. I always thought of it as facing this by myself. But I haven’t really been alone, have I? You’ve been there the whole time. Helping me study, distracting me when I need to think about anything other than school, listening to me talk about mythology for years.

“And you were right before. There have been others that have supported me too. I’ve never had to do things entirely on my own. There have been people over the years like my history teachers that have provided me with opportunities that helped me navigate life and school. I’ve just been so caught up in my own self-doubt that I wasn’t able to notice who I had in my corner. I always knew I had you, though. You’ve always been my biggest supporter. And your belief in me makes me want to at least try to believe in myself.”

Clarke didn’t think she could love him anymore than she already did, but Bellamy always does end up surprising her.

A year later they’re sitting in the exact same spot as Bellamy accepts a job offer to start teaching freshman history at Arkadia High.

A month after that Clarke is reading over Bellamy’s lesson plan for his first class on early Greek mythology. He has an entire lesson plotted out about the titan Cronus’ consumption of his own children. She’s pretty sure she’s never felt prouder.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Prompt me on [Tumblr](https://queentheea.tumblr.com)


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